The Samsung Z is the world’s first commercial Tizen phone

Next challenge: Showing why customers would want a Tizen phone.

Samsung loves the TouchWiz interface it has built on top of Android, but the company would be a whole lot happier if it didn't have to share the spotlight of its devices with Google. Enter Tizen, a Samsung-built OS that basically looks and works like a clone of Android but doesn't have anything to do with Google's open source OS. While Tizen has been in development for some time, Samsung has finally announced the first commercial Tizen device: the Samsung Z.

The device specs seem to be a mix of midrange components and high-end parts from last year. It's sporting a 4.8" 1280×720 AMOLED screen, a 2.3GHz quad core processor, 2GB of RAM, 16GB of storage, an 8MP camera, and a 2600 mAh battery. Samsung has also thrown in some Galaxy S5 features: a heart rate sensor, a fingerprint scanner, and an ultra power-saving mode. The tech specs wouldn't cut it in the high-end US market, but the Z is only headed to Russia for now.

It's rare to see a Samsung product with such a short name, as Samsung products are generally given a sub-brand. Android devices use "Galaxy" (as in the Samsung Galaxy S5), Windows devices use "Ativ," and even Samsung's Bada OS devices had the "Wave" sub-brand. Tizen is just "Samsung [model number]." It doesn't have any extra branding at all, which we think denotes how important the project is to Samsung. Tizen devices are 100% Samsung products and don't need any other branding.

Further Reading

While Tizen is not an Android fork, it will have a lot of the same problems as Android forks—namely, how do you replace the Google services that Android and iOS have? Samsung is tackling this issue in two ways. Apps can be HTML5-based, so one of the ways Samsung is dealing with the fledgling app selection is to pack in shortcuts to mobile websites. The Tizen phone we played with at CES came with shortcuts to the Google and YouTube mobile sites in the app drawer.

The other solution is coming from Yandex, a Russian company sometimes called the "Google of Russia." Yandex offers a range of services for Android, the biggest of which is Yandex.Kit, which bills itself as a drop-in replacement for the Android Google apps. Yandex.Kit comes with a new search engine, launcher, app store, dialer, browser, maps, and mail service. While Samsung probably doesn't want Tizen to be reskinned that much (oh, the irony), a lot of those services can fill in the blanks that Tizen currently has. The press release doesn't mention it, but the default search in the press image is Yandex, so there is some kind of partnership between the two companies. Yandex and Samsung have collaborated in the past on apps for the Bada OS, Samsung's previous attempt at a home-built OS. Yandex's ability to compete with Google's wide range of products most likely contributed to the decision to launch in Russia.

While a real, shipping device is a great first step, Samsung still has to show why customers would actually want a Tizen device. Samsung says "the Samsung Z makes the perfect choice for consumers who want a differentiated user experience," a phrase that has never been uttered by any real customer. If Samsung wants to convince people to use Tizen, it will have to prove that the OS is better than Android instead of just a shameless clone of it.

Ron Amadeo
Ron is the Reviews Editor at Ars Technica, where he specializes in Android OS and Google products. He is always on the hunt for a new gadget and loves to rip things apart to see how they work. Emailron.amadeo@arstechnica.com//Twitter@RonAmadeo